Ripley Show returns to the Yorkshire agriculture calendar with stunning castle as the setting

As Ripley Show looks to make a comeback to this year’s show calendar after a COVID enforced absence, organisers say the pandemic and the need to recruit new people onto show committees has made them think differently about how they operate.

Only the Second World War and Foot and Mouth had stopped Ripley Show going ahead prior to 2020 and then restrictions and the uncertainty that came with it the last two years were also scrapped.

Show planners came back to find the cost of putting on a show has rocketed by as much as 40 per cent.

This is not unique to Ripley Show, says chairman Michael Smith – but to most local shows, which for many residents in rural areas, are the only ones they can get to.

He said: “Everything has had to change. Costs have increased for all local shows by 30 to 40 per cent. The prices of fuel and catering has gone through the roof.

“Even the cost of printing the schedule has gone up three or four times. For the same money we paid two years ago we have half, or a quarter, of the copies.”

Ripley Show, set against the spectacular backdrop of Ripley Castle, though will still print programmes – not least because it is easier to navigate in a booklet than on your phone – but because it is now setting about striking a balance between ‘how it’s always been done’ and looking to make Ripley Show, now in its 173rd year, a sustainable event for many more years to come.

For example, Mr Smith remembers as a child “just turning up” with his grandfather to put up sheep pens each year and the same thing happens now. There are no phone calls or organisation, it just happens.

On the other hand the act of getting people there has gone digital.

Mr Smith said: “It is the first year we have done online entries as well as paper so that is a bit of an experiment.

“We have sold 400 tickets as of August 1, initially it was committee members going around knocking on doors. We will continue to offer a small number of schedules that are paper but we are keen to be making things more efficient in terms of making things online.

“(Shows) need to embrace the option for people to enter online and pay by card not cash on the gate. We are very much trying to move forward with that.

“We need the next generation to move in. Most of our committee are older and most are third generation volunteers. I am and most of the others are so it is a case of what comes next?”

What is the same, though, are the variety of classes being offered at Ripley Show.

Throughout the day on Sunday visitors will find showjumping, inhand and ridden classes, horticultural, crafts, cattle, sheep, young farmers, vintage machinery, terrier racing, sheepdog trials, dry-stone walling and even a giant tortoise.

Classes start from 8.30am.

Mr Smith added: “We are immensely looking forward to it. It is part of Ripley and the surrounding area, apart from The Great Yorkshire Show, it is almost Harrogate show because we are so near. The forecast is good so we are expecting lots of people.”